


What’s The (Brain) Matter With You?

by GothMoth



Series: May's Phantastical Callings [35]
Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Blood, Blood and Gore, Blood and Injury, Broken Bones, Danny Is Not Nearly As Worried As He Should Be, Everyone Is Freaked Out, Explosions, Gen, Graphic Description, Head Injury, Major Character Injury, Reveal, Swearing, Weird Biology, Weird Ghost Healing, Your Classmate Is Dead Shenanigans, immortal danny
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-26
Updated: 2020-05-26
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:02:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,884
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24380971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GothMoth/pseuds/GothMoth
Summary: Danny gets graphically injured, freaks out his class, and possibly changes the definition of ‘dead’; all in one unassuming English class.
Series: May's Phantastical Callings [35]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1405315
Comments: 81
Kudos: 732





	What’s The (Brain) Matter With You?

**Author's Note:**

> DannyMay 2020 Day 25: Break

Why does bad shit always have to happen in English class? Knowing Danny’s luck it was probably because Lancer was the one teacher that still actively paid attention to him and cared. What was actually surprising is that this time it had nothing to do with ghosts. Well okay, it _did_ have to do with ectoplasm and it _was_ partially Danny’s fault and he _was_ a ghost. So ghosts were sorta involved. Kinda. Not really though. 

Now see the reason the explosion was partly Danny’s fault was because of a particular very explosive reaction certain chemicals have with ectoplasm; and Danny was dumb enough to just _assume_ there wasn’t enough ‘plasm in him to be an issue. Course his dumbass was wrong. Figures. That was his kind of luck after all. 

It was also technically his health teacher’s fault though, wanting to do that ‘lets take samples of our blood and look at it’ class project. Which yes, had made Danny more than a little worried, since his blood has some strange shit. But apparently the class rule was you could only look at your own, so it was whatever. He still destroyed his slides though. But _of course_ the science class had to share a biohazards and chemical waste trash bin. _Of course_. And _of course_ there had to be enough of his ‘plasm to react with things violently but belatedly. And _of course_ whatever they did with the waste bins happened to be located right below his English classroom. And finally, _of course_ , said explosive reaction had to happen directly below him and absolutely with enough force to kill someone. 

Considering how the explosion had torn a hole through the floor, launched him with a yelp into the ceiling, blown his desk and chair to smithereens, blew out half the classroom windows, put _another_ hole through the ceiling, and that’s without mentioning any injuries. Which, in predictable fashion, Danny was the only one with serious injuries. Sure, Danny preferred it that way. All things considered. But still. No one _liked_ broken bones, or getting impaled, or cracking their _fucking skull open_. Fucking Ancients. Danny’s pretty sure he had actually seen _brain matter_ go flying into a _wall_. And by broken bones, he mean so mostly his neck; which is at totally the wrong angle right now. Oh and his arm, which might actually be missing. And honestly, he’s pretty sure, like, _all_ his spine is super fucked up. Couple toes for sure. Maybe his jaw too. Also can’t currently see out of one eye, so there’s that. 

Danny wheezes slightly from the ground, spitting out bits of debris or dust or whatever out of his mouth. He’s not even going to bother with finishing mental self-assessment. Because fuck his organs are _a mess_ and he is absolutely just making a pool of blood right now. He should probably cut that out before passes out or something. Maybe. He’s not sure if he even _can_ pass out from blood loss nowadays. 

He’s definitely glad for the ringing in his ears to cut it the Hell out. Even if that gives him the very unpleasant reminder that his is currently surrounded by people, people he _knows_ at that. 

Needless to say, everyone’s freaking the Hell out. 

* * *

Lancer’s doing his best to keep the class calm or at the very least calm enough for him to be able to check that everyone’s alright; while the dust and bits of debris settled enough to actually see. “Alright everyone! Please come over to the door _slowly_ and let me check you over. Then head outside”. 

The teens, predictably, do _not_ go slowly. Most practically rushing over to him, but thankfully the first few seem fine and are more than eager to get out of the room. 

Lancer gets halfway through his class when the dust settles enough for him to notice the absolute carnage in the back of the class. The _hole in the ceiling_ letting in extra light and practically highlighting the blood splatter. Lancer abandons his task at spotting a mangled pale arm speared on a piece of the broken window glass. Gaping at blood dripping to the floor with a chunk of white and red fabric from the severed end. 

Everyone following Lancer with their eyes as he basically shouts, “Daniel!”, and moves as fast as his overweight and old body will let him, to the back of the classroom. Mentally trying to ignore the blood and even bits of flesh while fanning away dust. Fanning more away after finding and grabbing a red and white shoe, feeling frankly stunned but also deeply relieved at hearing a, “hey ow, that’s, like, definitely broken”, at least the teen wasn’t _dead_. 

Lancer promptly exclaiming, “Chicken Soup For The Soul!”, and scrambling to back away, followed by a bunch of shrieking and gagging sounds from the rest of the class, when Daniel pushes himself up on one arm and is missing _half his head and face_ ; said head is also _rolling around his shoulders limply_. 

Lancer finding his voice and sputtering, “h- _how_?”, because this was impossible. 

Daniel just grabs a piece of shrapnel, that likely was once a chair leg, and just _wraps it around his neck_ ; effectively making a hard brace and forcing his head to stay upright and blinks his one eye at Lancer. “Uh, could use some help here”, when no one moves and just openly gapes at him (or in Jesse’s case, throws up), Daniel just leans on his one arm, “that’s alright, I got this”, and grabs a corner of a desk to start yanking himself to stand up with a bit of grunting. Everyone watching his back making some seriously strange movements. 

Lancer shakes himself off when Daniel repeatedly falls on his ass after letting go of the desk, his back basically crumpling in on itself every time, grumbling, “Ah dammit”. Lancer actually physically shakes his head and moves to grab Daniel and hoist him up to be laying on an intact desk away from the hole in the ground and glass shards scattered around. Daniel grumbling some more, “the goal wasn’t to just lay down somewhere else”. 

Lancer swallows, “Daniel, I don’t think you _can_ stand right now”. 

Kwan just loses it at this, “how the _fuck_ are you even _alive_. You’re _missing your face!?!_ ”. 

Lancer has to seriously resist gagging himself at Daniel patting at his face, even touching exposed bone and shredded muscle, “oh shit, so _that’s_ why I’m missing an eye. Huh. Fancy that”. Then sticks his one arm out, “someone hand me a pole and strips of fabric”. Brittney doing exactly that with very shaky hands. 

Lancer just numbly moves to hold the teen up by his armpits, pointedly ignoring all the blood getting smeared on him in the process; _just how much blood could one body hold???_ While Daniel makes the motions of attempting to tie the pole to his back. Three other students jerkily moving to help him, two with tears in their eyes and clearly trying not to just break down. 

Lancer joins everyone else in openly gapping some more when Daniel actually _stands up_ , kicks a bit of debris and mumbles, “oh yeah, totally broke a few toes”. 

Lancer clears his throat and grabs Daniel’s arm, “Daniel, how are you- you need you stay sitting”. 

Daniel blinks, moves the arm with surprising strength and _scratches the inside of his head_ , “uh, but I’d like to have something back where it belongs. I don’t know ‘bout you, but not having a brain makes it kinda hard to think”. 

Quite a few people mutter, “what the _fuck_ ”. And Lancer can’t help but agree, he’s not even going to chastise them for swearing. 

While Daniel wobble walks back over near the hole, Lancer muttering disbelievingly, “careful”. Daniel predictably just waves him off over his shoulder and makes his way to the window. 

Quite a few more people gag or mutter, “this is disgusting”, but clearly keep watching anyway; while Daniel rips his arm off the chunk of glass, blood splattering down from it, and shoves it in his mouth. Even Lancer has a seriously hard time not throwing up at that. While Daniel starts searching around and picking up pale red chunks off the ground. 

Everyone’s dead silent while Daniel makes his way to a desk near them while cradling the fleshy bits in his attached arm, which Lancer’s has now realised are probably chunks of brain matter. The teen flops into a desk and spits the arm onto the desk top, causing more gagging sounds from the class, as it flops around with notably limp fingers. 

Lancer blinks, “Daniel... what are you doing?”, shaking his head while Daniel starts shoving bits of the _Probable brain matter_ inside his head using the _missing part of his head_ as an easy entry hole. Lancer doesn’t have any words for any of this and shakily fishes into his pocket, “right, I should probably call an ambulance”. He should have done that _a while_ ago. But this was- Daniel should be _dead_. 

Lancer actually jumps a little from Daniel snapping his head around using his hand, since his neck is clearly _broken_ , “I'd rather you _not_ do that. In all honestly”, one of the brain chunks flying out of his head due to the speed with which he turned his head to splatter against the wall. Daniel turns his head to look at it, then back at the class, “uh, anyone wanna get that?”. 

Todd walks over to the piece while maintaining very disbelievingly eye contact with the teen and picks it up using his jacket sleeve, awkwardly saying, “here”, as he hands the bit over. 

Daniel grunts like the guy had just picked up his pencil, “thanks, ‘preciate it”, and _dust it off_ before just _stuffing back into his head_. 

Lancer swallows and looks from his phone to Daniel, “uh, I think I _should_ call. Why shouldn’t I? Daniel -Call Of The Wild- you are missing your arm and half your _head_ ”. 

Daniel shrugs, “your point being? Me and hospitals have a rocky relationship. Meaning a nonexistent one. I’m kinda too weird for ‘em”. 

Kwan parrots, “‘kinda’”. 

Daniel nods, “yup”, and freaking pops the ‘p’. 

Dale sticks his hands out to the side, “do you feel like expanding on that? Like, _seriously_ ”. 

Lancer nods, “again, _why_ shouldn't I call?”. If Lancer has to make some form of a guess, it would have to be something to do with the fact that Daniel _shouldn’t be alive right now_. 

Daniel just haphazardly shoves the rest of the chunks in his head, which looks to be _reforming parts of his skull_ and even _flesh_. War Of The World’s, this was beyond strange and frankly, incredibly disgusting. 

Daniel responds while literally _holding the chunks of brain in place_ with his hand, “well, I mean, they kinda would freak over my vitals and my blood’s some strange shit”, looking down to his arm and nodding at it, “someone wanna hold this up fer me, rather get that reattached _before_ it gets all melty”. 

Todd jerks to pick it up and continues giving a disbelieving look at Daniel but with a slight questioning look added in. Daniel rolls his eyes, “just hold the ends together, dude”. Todd glares but does as he’s told. Everyone gapes and Lancer drops his phone on the floor, watching as the flesh, muscle and blood from the two ends start meshing back together and bubbling; his fingers even start twitching. 

Lancer swallows and clears his throat, this kind of healing? wasn’t even _possible_. People can’t _reattach limbs_. Lancer’s pretty sure no creature can do that actually. “Daniel, that explains nothing. You shouldn’t even _have_ vitals right now. You should be _dead_ ”. 

Daniel glances his eye around and shrugs a little, “well, uh, cats outta the bag I guess”, then looks Lancer right in the eyes, which Lancer has to try _very_ hard not to gag over because the teens _eye socket_ is reforming grotesquely, “don’t gotta worry ‘bout me dying, cause I’m kinda already dead”. 

Lancer joins the class in sputtering, “ _what_???”. 

Kwan squeaks, “so you’re a freaking _zombie_?”, looking more than a little freaked. 

Daniel tilts his head and chuckles, “no. Close though, I guess”, Daniel physically turns his head with his hand to look around, “anyone seen an eye by chance? Takes a lot more energy to reform than reattach”. 

Lancer blinks, arms limp at his sides, “no one has been looking, Daniel”. 

Daniel shrugs, “fair enough. Probably crushed anyway”, shrugging again, “least I got my brain stuff”, chuckling, “you know how much energy it is to put a brain back together, the human body is _so_ complicated”. 

Lancer gives a very awkward, “yeah. It is”. 

Jesse tentatively pokes the boy when he uses the _reattached_ arm/hand to pat at the _reformed_ skull and skin, hair starting to seemingly _regrow_ off of it. Jesse asking, “so, about the _dead_ thing?”. 

Daniel blinks, “yeah?”, continuing when everyone glares at him, including Lancer, “it’s been, like, two years. It’s not my fault you never noticed. I’ve got some ‘plasm that keeps me going”. 

Lancer blinks, “as in ectoplasm?”, shaking his head and scrunching up his eyebrows. Come to think of it, Daniel had been weird ever since that electrical accident that kept him from attending school for a bit. “That electrocution?”. 

Daniel nods and points at him, smiling; which is seriously off-putting, since this situation and topic does _not_ call for smiling. “That’s the one! Totally didn’t survive that shit. I mean, it was what? four billion volts? Pretty sure it’s impossible to survive that”, shrugging, “but I had some ‘plasm to keep me goin’, so here I am. I’m not complaining. Though yeah, this is supremely fucking painful. So if anyone’s got, like, some narcotics, that’d be _great_ ”. 

Lancer walks a bit stiffly to his desk and pulls out a bottle, “it’s... not much, but I have some Advil”. Daniel just shrugs and takes it, removing the bent metal chair leg from his neck after and bending his neck around. Lancer shakes his head, “‘four billion’ that's Four times the amount in a bolt of lightning”. 

Daniel nods, “sounds about right”. Earning more gapping from the class. 

Everyone looks up then as the class over bell goes off, then looks to Lancer. Who immediately says, “everyone’s free to go home”, looking specifically at Daniel, “and you can just stay right there till you’re done... _this_ ”, shaking his head, “are you _seriously_ going to be alright? And you are... dead?”. 

Daniel nods, “yup. Just need a bit to rearrange my spine and some organs. Kinda probably soup on the inside”, shrugging, “but uh, I guess be happy that was me who got all mangled and broken. Anyone else and you be dealing with a corpse. Well, a non-responsive corpse anyway. I’m not really sure if I count as a corpse or not”. 

Dale mutter, “oh my Zone. This seriously messed up”. 

Daniel chuckles, “yeah, welcome to my existence. It’s usually pretty messed up. Shoulda seen the first time I got decapitated. That was _wild_. Don’t recommend”. 

Quite a few people gag and mutter about going home. Which seems to amuse the teen, based on the smirking. Lancer shakes his head, “I think I don’t really want to know”. 

All the people still left turn their heads to the door when Tucker appears, points at Daniel, laughs, and says, “dude, your hair is fucked up”.

Daniel chuckles, “yeah, kinda lost my head for a bit there”. Lancer’s just going to assume Daniel’s friends know about his... dead state, since Tucker just chuckles and shrugs. 

Tucker points to the hole, “someone mixed your blood with some of those reactive chemicals, by the way. You really can’t help destroying shit, can you?”. 

Daniel smirks, “no”. 

Todd’s blinks any Daniel, “your blood’s explosive?”. 

Daniel just shrugs, “can be, under the right circumstances. There’s kinda ‘plasm mixed in it, and that shit is _super_ reactive. Not to mention corrosive, and toxic, and ecto-radioactive. My blood’s like, technically pretty dangerous stuff”. 

Dale tilts his head, “so _that’s_ why you didn’t really want to do the blood examination thing”. 

Daniel nods readily, “exactly, guess I really shouldn’t have. Really _blew up in my face_ there”. Then unties the metal pole from his back, gets up, and stretches out. Looking down at his heavily bloodied clothing, “well, I doubt the school would be okay with me walking around in this”. 

Tucker waves him off and walks over, stepping over debris like it’s nothing, “eh whatever, fuck ‘em”, and grabs Daniel to pull him out of the classroom. 

Lancer calls after them numbly, “just go home”. The boys unsurprisingly shrug, the rest of Lancer’s students leaving shortly after. Leaving Lancer looking around his destroy classroom disbelievingly. Eyes settling on the blood splattered everywhere. Daniel’s blood... which he literally just said was basically an extreme hazard. 

Well there’s nothing for it, moving to grab up a mop and bucket, and getting to work. Having to seriously force down bile and trying to not think about any of this; but considering the little specks of green he can make out here and there, Daniel wasn’t lying. 

**End.**


End file.
